Rescue of Goat From High on Bridge Nearly Goes Very Wrong

"Forget a solar eclipse. We were on goat watch," Tori Fugate of the KC Pet Project says of a Monday mountain goat rescue in Kansas City, Missouri. An escaped mountain goat that appeared to be stuck on bridge support pillars was rescued without broken bones, but it was almost killed in what the Kansas City Star calls an "ill-advised" rescue attempt by a bystander who used to work as an animal control officer. The bystander managed to get a rope around the goat's neck in an attempt to guide it to safety, but the animal was left hanging by its neck after it tried to jump to another bridge support.

Rescuers initially thought the goat had died, but it bucked after a minute. Rescuers cut the rope and it fell around 15 feet to a spot where padding had been placed. "He miraculously has no broken bones," Fugate tells the AP. She says the bridge supports were around 80 feet above the ground and goat would not have survived a fall from that height. "This was a delicate situation," Fugate says. The goat was taken to the KC Pet Project for overnight care.

Fugate says the goat was brought to a shelter March 13 as a stray and escaped almost immediately after he was adopted later that month. She says a family that lives around two hours away believes he is their goat, Chug, who was stolen months ago, and will visit the shelter Wednesday. "Thanks to his media fame, yesterday we had somebody reach out and they said that he is very similar to their goat that went missing back in February." She says the people who adopted the goat won't mind if the other family takes him home. "He seems to be very particular about his living situation," Fugate says. (More mountain goat stories.)